Towards Acceptance, Holiness and Removing Stumbling Blocks
This week, we are once again reading Parashat Kedoshim (Leviticus 19:1-20:27). Biblical scholars commonly refer to these two chapters of Leviticus as the holiness code due to the numerous interpersonal commandments (mitzvot) that are found within. These mitzvot form the foundation of Torah and are applicable to everyone. In addition to loving our neighbor as [...]
After Auschwitz, What?
After Auschwitz, no theology: From the chimneys of the Vatican, white smoke rises — a sign the cardinals have chosen themselves a Pope. From the crematoria of Auschwitz, black smoke rises — a sign the conclave of Gods hasn’t yet chosen the Chosen People.1 –Yehuda Amichai On Yom HaShoah, the Jewish day to mourn [...]
Pope Francis: How to Make New Artifacts from Old Power
“We have many experts on the terrain of conflict, but not many leaders. Good Christian leadership radiates a very different presence in a broken world.” I came across these words by Emmanuel Katongole and Chris Rice—from their 2008 book entitled Reconciling All Things—the day after Pope Francis raised the Christian practice of foot-washing to new [...]
Mining our Political Past for Spiritual Sustenance
A few weeks ago, I completed my final assignment from my third semester of rabbinical school (which ended in January). I’m not one to put things off like that, but this was a special assignment. It involved sitting in a Brooklyn apartment with close to twenty young Jews (and maybe a couple non-Jews?) studying the [...]
Bishop of Bishops! (Mormon Poetry for a Catholic Moment)
Habemus papam, and everyone seems to know it. Something that surprised me during Pope Francis’ election process was the way that this event seemed to produce an ripple of Catholic consciousness that extended far beyond the normal bounds of the Catholic community. I remember, for example, the way that several of my non-Catholic friends and [...]
Gavrielle Blank: My Commitment to Building Relationships with Others from Different Religious or Ethical Traditions
As a child growing up in Los Angeles, my friends and I were from all sorts of different backgrounds, religions, and traditions, and we accepted this diversity as normal and beautiful. We were fascinated by each other’s differences, and we loved and accepted each other as we were. Of course, I had no idea how [...]
My spring break: from faith clubs to the interfaith social movement
Last year, while I was still a student in rabbinical school and serving as advisor to Jewish students at Haverford College, I helped to organize and staff an Interfaith Encounters alternative spring break trip run by the Interfaith Center of Greater Philadelphia. I found the experience so meaningful that even though I no longer serve [...]
Rozemarijn Vanwijnsberghe On Building Relationships with those from Different Traditions
Managing Director’s Note: beginning in the Spring of 2013, all Contributing Scholars will answer the following question as their first post: Why are you committed to building relationships with those from different religious or ethical traditions? Listen … “You are the first human rights worker who came down to meet us here in the desert [...]
Joseph McLendon On Building Relationships with those from Different Traditions
Managing Director’s Note: beginning in the Spring of 2013, all Contributing Scholars will answer the following question as their first post: Why are you committed to building relationships with those from different religious or ethical traditions? My tenacity towards interfaith dialogue is tripartite. My personal upbringing, academic, and chosen religious beliefs all call me to [...]
The Election of the New Hope: Dispatch from Rome
Last night I went to Saint Peter’s Square in Rome. I hoped to to see the black smoke of the papal conclave. I figured the dark puff would roil out from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and the sorry crowd would disperse into the dusk. I heard the smoke would disperse around 4:30pm so [...]
Contributing Scholars
Benjamin BarerBenjamin Barer is the Assistant Editor at Large for State of Formation at the Journal of Inter-Religious Dialogue. He has spent his young life studying Judaism and Jewish texts in exclusively Jewish environments. He is looking to take that intimate knowledge of the tradition and share it with wider communities, touching on the pressing issues facing the Jewish world, and the world as a whole. Towards that end, he has started work at Hebrew College as a research assistant splitting time between CIRCLE — the Centre for Inter-Religious and Communal Leadership Education, jointly hosted by Andover Newton Theological School and Hebrew College — and the Centre for Global Judiasm, at Hebrew College. Text study is the epicentre of his connection to Judaism, and he is keenly interested in widening the scope of that passion to include other scriptures. Benjamin blogs regularly at whatibelievein.wordpress.com
Ben DeVanBenjamin B. DeVan has taught religion, philosophy, and African American literature at North Carolina Central University, Peace College, and a January term mini-course at MIT titled, "Religion: Bringing the World Together, or Tearing the World Apart?" He completed his MA in Counseling at Asbury Theological Seminary, his MDiv at Duke University, a ThM at Harvard in World Religions with a thesis on evangelical Christians and Muslims, and is now a doctoral candidate at a historic British university writing a dissertation on the New Atheism.
Patrick BrownPatrick is the Digital Media Coordinator at Liturgy Training Publications and is working on a master's degree at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, IL.